How to Cite Materials From Meetings and Symposia

 

by Jeff Hume-Pratuch

If you’re attending the APA Convention this week in Orlando, Florida, you’ll probably come away with some great new research to use. But how to cite it? Let’s dive right in with a few examples.

Papers and Poster Sessions

Adams-Labonte, S. K. (2012, August). Daytime impairment due to college students’ technology use during sleep: Similarities to sleep apnea. Poster session presented at the meeting of the American Psychological Association, Orlando, FL. Nguyen, C. A. (2012, August). Humor and deception in advertising: When laughter may not be the best medicine. Paper presented at the meeting of the American Psychological Association, Orlando, FL.

Notice that the date field contains not only the year but also the month of the conference.

Symposia
A symposium is a bit like a live-action edited book: Several authors come together under the leadership of the chair to pool their knowledge about a topic.

Krinsky-McHale, S. J., Zigman, W. B., & Silverman, W. (2012, August). Are neuropsychiatric symptoms markers of prodromal Alzheimer’s disease in adults with Down syndrome? In W. B. Zigman (Chair), Predictors of mild cognitive impairment, dementia, and mortality in adults with Down syndrome. Symposium conducted at the meeting of the American Psychological Association, Orlando, FL.

Convention Blogging
Leading up to the convention, APA staff have been blogging about featured speakers and presentations. Here’s how you would cite one of those blog posts.

Mills, K. I. (2012, July 25). Why do people hurt themselves? [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://apaconvention.com/2012/07/20/why-do-people- hurt-themselves

Published Proceedings
APA generally does not publish proceedings of the annual convention (although selected abstracts are available in the online program). However, APA often publishes proceedings of more specialized meetings. Here’s an example:

Parsons, O. A., Pryzwansky, W. B., Weinstein, D. J., & Wiens, A. N. (1995). Taxonomy for psychology. In J. N. Reich, H. Sands, & A. N. Wiens (Eds.), Education and training beyond the doctoral degree: Proceedings of the American Psychological Association National Conference on Postdoctoral Education and Training in Psychology (pp. 45–50). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Increasingly, proceedings are being made available on CD to reduce publishing costs. If that’s the case with your source, just add [CD] after the title. If the proceedings are published online, substitute “Retrieved from URL” for the publisher and location.

If you’re attending the APA convention in Orlando this week, do stop by one of our publishing seminars (to find them, go to http://forms.apa.org/convention/index.cfm?convention=Division and search on “P&C - APA Publications and Communications Board”). See you next year at the APA convention in Hawaii!